


Trust and Healing

by the_blue_fairie



Category: Rapunzel's Tangled Adventure (Cartoon), Tangled (2010)
Genre: Cassunzel Week (Disney), Cassunzel Week 2020 (Disney), F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-25
Updated: 2020-07-25
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:21:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25503583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_blue_fairie/pseuds/the_blue_fairie
Summary: With Rapunzel in great peril, a knight in shining armor must come to her rescue.
Relationships: Cassandra/Eugene Fitzherbert | Flynn Rider/Rapunzel, Cassandra/Rapunzel (Disney: Tangled)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 52





	Trust and Healing

_Cassandra had a kinship with Joan of Arc. Now Rapunzel had that too._

_She thought of that as her executioner raised his torch._

He did not have the chance to set her pyre alight, for a clamor resounded in the distance – the shouts, bellows and consternation of men before the trampling of hooves.

Men scattered before the flash of armor in the sun, brilliant and blinding – before the glint of sword-steel, Fidella’s whinnies drowning out their cries.

For the horse was Fidella – chestnut-brown, dark mane braided like a warrior-queen of old – and upon her back, Cassandra – Cassandra, looking so like Joan, but not like Joan at the end, like Joan in victory, Joan in glory.

Cassandra wore no helm, so that any who dared advance upon her might see her face before she cut them down. The sunlight flooded behind her, making her raven hair to gleam. Guardsmen armed with swords as stern as her own gathered around her, armed with spears they hurled in a great wave that lanced upon her shield. Fidella continued to charge forward, routing them, sending them reeling – and still some, undaunted, approached again.

Cassandra swung at them deftly, smote them with her sword. One got close, attempting to hew at Fidella; the horse kicked him down. Another neared, eyes glaring before Cassandra’s face – she bludgeoned him with her sword-hilt, knocked him backward, and rode on.

By now, the executioner had thrown down his torch and fled. Still, it sputtered upon the ground, dangerously close to the piles of wood. Rapunzel’s eyes darted downward repeatedly, fixed on every stray spark. But she had more immediate perils. One man, fanatical in his zeal, lunged for the torch to finish the fiery work. He was dead before his fingers grasped it. Cassandra threw her sword with elegant precision so that it found his back as an archer’s arrow finds its target.

The marveling crowd parted for her. She drew her sword from the lifeless body and, with it, cut Rapunzel’s bonds.

Rapunzel threw herself upon Fidella, wrapping her arms around Cassandra tightly, holding her close, knowing she was real but wanting to be sure, wanting to be sure this was not some taunting vision before the flames consumed her.

“Eugene, is he –”

“He’s alive.”

Rapunzel’s head fell forward like a dying woman’s – and yet she was alive. In the perfect mirror of Cassandra’s pauldron, she saw her haggard face – wax-soft and curtained by limp brown hair, wax-soft as an icon about to melt.

Cassandra’s armor was cool as the press of ice upon a feverish brow – soothing after the prospect of the fire.

Rapunzel shut her eyes and breathed.

The crowd looked on them in wonder and let them pass.

They rode until the came to a balmy meadow, and it was then that Rapunzel felt the strength to raise her eyes again. And when she did, she realized there was a dampness upon her hands – and that the dampness was blood.

Panic seized her. _No, she wasn’t going to lose Cass. Not again. Not this time._

She must have been stammering desperately aloud, for Cass murmured, “I’m fine, Raps. I’m fine.”

“No, you’re not! Stop – Stop Fidella now.”

Cass had no choice but to obey.

It was a small cut in Cassandra’s side – from sword or dagger. How it slipped through the plate armor, Rapunzel did not know – but Cass had been up against many adversaries, some of whom had gotten closer than others.

It was only a small cut, the kind Cass could withstand easily. But any cut at all – any chance of losing Cass – again –

Rapunzel tore a shred from the prison-garb in which she was still attired and bandaged the cut with it.

“I’m sorry, I know it’s not enough, I –”

Cassandra hugged her – hugged her as tightly as Rapunzel had clung to Cass when riding out of Corona.

“It’s so much, Raps. _So much_.”

Rapunzel broke down crying in Cassandra’s arms and Cassandra held her, murmuring _I love you_ and _I’m here_ over and over again.

When the tears had stopped, Cass caressed Rapunzel’s face – caressed it and brought it close and kissed her – and this time, the kiss did not taste of blood but of the sweetest of fruits, a peach-soft kiss, a kiss to savor…

And when they broke the kiss, Cass spoke softly:

“You’ve done so much, Raps. You’ve seen so much. You can rest.”

Rapunzel smiled feebly. “So can you…”

“We all can. We all shall.”

They rode on.

They rode on and in time they were riding through a fertile valley. Lush green, it was, and scattered with the loveliest of flowers. They rode amid the emerald slopes until they passed under the curtain of a waterfall. The cavern beyond was drier than Rapunzel expected, illumined by the sunbeams passing through the glittering water. The fall hung like a veil from an antique land or like threaded jewels, casting a rainbow-halo.

It would have been exquisitely serene were it not for the rancid odor emanating from above.

“Welcome – to the – queen of beggars,” drawled an unmistakably slurred voice. Shorty was dangling by his toes from a crag overhead – the perfect position to place a colorful paper crown on Rapunzel’s head. He then fell and fortuitously landed into a stewpot nearby, much to the chagrin of –

“Eugene!”

She leapt off Fidella and ran to him. His arm was in a sling, so she had to hug him delicately, but in the delicateness of that hug was love beyond words. And when Cass placed a hand on Rapunzel’s shoulder in tenderness, the radiance of that love shone brighter than the sun through the veil of the water, brighter than the rainbow of love dancing around them both.

And on Eugene’s shoulder, shifting colors gleefully with the rainbow haze around them, was Pascal – and Rapunzel felt her heart was close to bursting with joy.

Shorty gave a thumbs up from the stewpot, then commented that it needed more salt. Precisely how he had gotten to their refuge was anyone’s guess, but he had a habit of popping up places, and his wildness was a welcome distraction from the worse wildness of the world.

They were an odd sort of family in that cavern, but a lovely little one. And as the scars began to heal, Rapunzel began to paint again. And the first thing she painted was a beautiful knight and queen riding a fair steed away from a pyre – a work of art as lovely as any artist’s depiction of Lancelot's rescue of Guinevere…


End file.
